A person in a hazmat suit is escorted to an ambulance from a medical aircraft allegedly carrying some of the passengers from the cruise ship MV Hondius believed to be infected with the hantavirus, at Schiphol airport near Amsterdam on Wednesday. | AFP-JIJI

A luxury cruise ship hit by a deadly hantavirus outbreak and marooned since Sunday off the coast of Cape Verde left for Spain on Wednesday, one witness said, after three people, two of them seriously ill, were evacuated. The MV Hondius, with nearly 150 people on board, is expected to dock in Spain's Tenerife, in the Canary Islands, within three days, Spain's Health Minister Monica Garcia said, adding that those still on board were not presenting any symptoms of the disease.

Once in Tenerife, if they are still healthy, all non-Spanish citizens will be repatriated to their countries, Garcia told a news conference in ​Madrid. The 14 Spanish passengers will be quarantined in a military hospital in Madrid, she said.…